Green Power Leadership Awards: EPA Recognizes 17 Purchasers

The U.S. EPA recognized 17 of its partner organizations for making leading green power purchases at the Seventh Annual Green Power Leadership Awards. The awards are presented each year in coordination with the National Renewable Energy Marketing Conference. Award winners are evaluated on their efforts to increase awareness about green power by way of communicating their green power purchase to a broader audience. This year’s purchaser awardees included a mix of Fortune 500 companies, businesses, municipalities and a university.

The combined green power purchases of this year’s award winners amount to nearly four billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of green power annually, which is the equivalent amount of electricity needed to power nearly 250,000 average American households each year. EPA estimates that the combined environmental impact of these leading purchasers will avoid the equivalent amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of nearly 450,000 vehicles each year.

EPA’s purchaser award category is divided into three award sub groups: Green Power Partner of the Year, On Site Generation and Green Power Purchasing. This year’s Purchaser Award Winners are:

Green Power Leadership
Awards Video (Click Image)

Green Power Partner of the Year:

City of Bellingham, Wash.

Johnson & Johnson

Mohawk Fine Papers

PepsiCo

Staples

Wells Fargo & Company

Whole Foods Market

On Site Generation:

City of Chico, Calif.

Macy’s Inc., West Division

The Timberland Company

Green Power Purchasing:

Kohl’s Department Stores

New York University

PepsiAmericas Inc.

Pepsi Bottling Ventures

Sloan Valve Company, Illinois Manufacturing Facility

Starbucks

The Pepsi Bottling Group Inc.

EPA co-sponsors the Green Power Leadership Awards in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Energy (Supplier Awards) and the Center for Resource Solutions (Market Development Awards), with each organization recognizing a different segment of the industry.

Recap of 12th National Renewable Energy Marketing Conference

The 12th National Renewable Energy Marketing Conference took place in Philadelphia, PA on October 21-24. The theme of this year’s conference was “Marketing Renewables in a Carbon-Conscious World.” Nearly 400 attendees gathered for the conference to learn about the most important issues facing the industry today. The conference kicked off with a tour of the Atlantic City wind project, where participants were able to see up close an operational wind farm. One of the highlights of the conference included a keynote address from Pennsylvania Governor Edward G. Rendell. Attendees at the conference included power marketers, renewable energy developers, retail and wholesale green power suppliers, electric utilities, government agencies, energy consultants and executives from Fortune 500 companies. For additional information on the conference please visit the conference web site at: http://renewableenergymarketing.net

Fortune 500 Deadline Fast Approaching, Less Than Two Weeks Away

EPA’s Fortune 500 Green Power Challenge is scheduled to conclude on January 8, 2008. This will be the last day for Fortune 500 companies to make or increase their green power purchase in order to qualify for the Challenge. Partner data must be submitted to EPA no later than January 8, 2008.

EPA has challenged Fortune 500 companies to collectively purchase more than 5 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of green power annually. To date, the Challenge is well on its way to achieving this goal. EPA encourages interested corporations to make a purchase and take part in achieving this collective goal.

The achievement of the Challenge goal would represent enough green electricity to power more than 400,000 average American homes annually and would be equivalent to avoiding the CO2 emissions associated with more than 680,000 passenger cars each year.

Next Top Partner List Update Deadline: January 8, 2007

EPA is scheduled to update the Top Partner lists in late January, 2008. The deadline to submit updated Partner purchase information to EPA is January 8, 2008. This deadline is in effect for all of EPA’s Top Partner lists, the Fortune 500 Green Power Challenge and the College & University Green Power Challenge. Partners with updated green power purchase information should contact Blaine Collison (collison.blaine@epa.gov, 202-343-9139).

EPA Updates Top Partner Lists

In October, EPA updated its list of the Top 25 National Green Power Partners. PepsiCo remained the No. 1 purchaser for the second quarter in a row. Wells Fargo & Company, Whole Foods Market and the Pepsi Bottling Group, Inc. maintained their rankings. The list highlights EPA’s Green Power Partners that have completed the nation’s largest voluntary green power purchases for the period. New additions to the Top Partner lists include:

Top 10 Local Government List — Nassau County, NY (No. 6) and Montgomery County, Penn. (No. 9)

Top 10 Federal Government List — U.S. Department of Agriculture/HQ complex (No. 10)

Sector Spotlight: EPA Green Power Communities

As more and more communities embrace buying green power, EPA’s Green Power Partnership has recently added a new section to its web site to recognize their purchases. In the coming year EPA will continue to develop useful tools and resources for this sector to assist local governments, utilities and community stakeholders in organizing Green Power Community campaigns.

NREL/EPA Report: Renewable Electricity Supply and Demand

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) released a preliminary examination of the supply and demand balance for renewable electricity in the United States, with a focus on renewable energy projects that meet the generally accepted definition of “new” for voluntary market purposes, i.e., projects installed on or after January 1, 1997. After estimating current supply and demand, the report presents projections of the supply and demand balance out to 2010 and describes a number of key market uncertainties.

Key points:

Demand for renewable energy has been accelerating rapidly as a result of state renewable energy standard policies (both new and expanded policies) and voluntary purchases of renewable energy by end-use consumers, notably EPA Green Power Partners.

The analysis shows a shortage of renewable energy to meet expected demand from RPS and voluntary markets to 2010, based on two equally reasonable supply scenarios.

The paper does not portend a long-term shortage in renewable energy availability as it is likely that, with continuing Federal and state support, the renewable energy industry can ramp up production over the mid and long term.

Green power has captured the attention of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The FTC announced that it is beginning a regulatory review of its environmental marketing guidelines, also known as the Green Guides. The guides outline general principles for all environmental marketing claims and provide specifics about certain green claims. The Commission is requesting comments on “sustainable” and “renewable” claims. While the review was scheduled to begin in 2009, because of the current increase in green advertising claims, the Commission has accelerated its review of the guides to ensure they reflect today’s marketplace. The guides were last updated in 1998.

As part of the Green Guides review, the FTC will be holding public meetings or workshops on a number of green marketing topics. The first workshop on January 8, 2008, will address the marketing of carbon offsets and RECs. Through the workshop and related public comments, FTC staff will explore advertising claims related to these products, as well as issues of consumer perception, substantiation, and self-regulation. The workshop will take place on January 8, 2008 from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. at the FTC’s Conference Center at 601 New Jersey Ave NW, in Washington, DC.

For more information about the Carbon Offset and REC workshop, the staff contact is Hampton Newsome (202) 326-2889. Copies of the documents mentioned in this release are available from the FTC’s Web site at http://www.ftc.gov and from the FTC’s Consumer Response Center, Room 130, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Washington, DC 20580. Call toll-free: 1-877-FTC-HELP or visit, http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2007/11/enviro.shtm

US Government to Host Washington International Renewable Energy Conference (WIREC) March 4-6, 2008

The United States Government (USG), in cooperation with the American Council on Renewable Energy and several leading renewable energy trade associations, will host the Washington International Renewable Energy Conference March 4-6, 2008, at the Washington Convention Center. The global conference will build on previous renewable energy events held in Bonn, Germany in 2004 and later in Beijing, China in 2005. The meeting is designed to:

Advance energy security, climate change, air quality, and sustainable development goals, including agriculture and rural development;

Foster industry and government collaboration to help solve global energy challenges.

Approximately 2,000 people are expected to attend the USG-sponsored event including delegates from more than 90 countries. The official part of the conference will include a Ministerial Meeting for energy and environment ministers and other high-level stakeholders, as well as three days of plenary and breakout sessions on a wide variety of renewable energy policy, deployment, and financing topics. In addition, a trade show will be co-located with WIREC 2008, and conference organizers anticipate that dozens of official side events will be held by States, foreign governments, NGOs, private companies, and multinational organizations.